Rationale

This lesson will help students identify the phoneme /p/, represented by P. Students will remember to recognize /p/ in spoken words by learning a sound analogy (hitting a ping pong ball) and the letter symbol of P. Students will learn this by practice finding /p/ in words, and applying phoneme awareness with /p/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters. 

 

Materials

1. Whiteboard 

2. Markers

3. Primary paper and

4. Pencils

5. A chart with “Peter picked a peck of pickled peppers”

6. If You Give a Pig a Pancake by Laura Numeroff

7. 9-inch paper circle

8. Crayons/colors pencils

9. Word cards with PIG, LIP, POT, MUD, PINK, and STACK

10. Assessment worksheet for identifying /p/

 

Procedures 

1. Say: "Every letter in the alphabet has a unique sound that we make by moving our mouth a certain way. Today we are going to work on how to make the sound /p/ with our mouths. The sound /p/ is represented by the letter P (draw uppercase P on the whiteboard). The letter P looks like a ping pong paddle, and /p/ sounds like we are hitting a ping pong ball."

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2. Say: "Let’s pretend that we are all in a ping pong playing a game of ping pong, /p/, /p/, /p/. [Pantomiming hitting ping pong ball with hand]. Good job! You all beat your ping pong opponent because you hit the ping pong ball so well! When we say /p/, we tuck both of our lips over our teeth and blow out a puff of air." ​​

 

3. Say: "Now I will show you how we are going to find /p/ in the word jump. I will stretch out the word and say it super slow motion, so you can listen for when I hit the ping pong ball. Jjj-uu-ump. Slower: Jjj-u-u-u-m-p-p-p. There is the ping pong ball! I felt both of my lips tuck over my teeth, and I blew out a puff of air. Ping pong ball /p/ is in jump at the very end." 

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4. Say: "Next, let’s try a tongue ticker (on the chart)! Peter and his family live on a big farm. The thing that they grow the most is delicious peppers, but they are not just normal peppers, they are pickled peppers. One of Peter’s chores is to pick the peppers from the plant. Here is our tongue tickler: “Peter picked a peck of pickled peppers.” Everybody says it two times together. Now say the tickler again, but this time, let’s stretch out the /p/ at the beginning of the words. 'Pppeter pppicked a pppeck of pppickled pppeppers.' Try it one more time but break the /p/ from the word. '/p/eter /p/icked a /p/eck of /p/ickled /p/eppers.'" [Have students get out one sheet of primary paper and a pencil].

 

5. Say: "We use the letter P to spell /p/. The capital letter P looks like a ping pong paddle. Now, let’s write the lowercase letter p. [Modeling on the whiteboard with the same lines as primary paper drawn]. We are going to start at the fence and draw a line straight down past the sidewalk and into the ditch. Then, we start back at the top of our line on the fence and make a half-circle that goes down to the sidewalk to touch the straight line once again. I want to see how beautiful everyone’s p is! After I check your work, I want you to make 9 more just like the one we just drew together on your own." 

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6. Say: "Call on students to answer and explain how they know: do you hear /p/ in red or pink? Hop or run? Eye or lip? Say: Let’s see if you can spot the mouth move /p/ in some words. Hit your ping pong ball if you hear /p/: The, little, puppy, played, joyfully, with, pieces, of, paper."

 

7. Say: “Now we are going to read If You Give a Pig A Pancake by Laura Numeroff. This book is about an adorable little pig who loves to eat pancakes for breakfast, but she is very picky and will only eat them with syrup, but what will happen if you give a pig a pancake? Let’s read to find out! Also, when you hear /p/, hit your ping pong ball.  [Read book showing pictures to students]. Now that we have figured out what happens when you give a pig a pancake, I want you to think of your own event or circumstance that will happen if you gave a pig a pancake. [Hand out paper circles and drawing supplies]. Draw your event on one of the circles, and when we are all done, we are going to present our drawings and make a pancake stack out of them on the wall! 

 

8. Say: "Show the card with the word POT on it and model how to decide if it is pot or lot: the P tells me to hit my ping pong ball, so this word is pppot, pot. You try some: PINK: pink or stink? MAT: pat or mat? PIG: big or pig? LIP: lip or pip? STACK: pack or stack?"

For assessment, pass out the worksheet. Students color in the pictures that begin with the letter P. Call students up individually to read the phonetic cue words from step 8. 

 

 

Reference: 

A pig and a pancake activity:

https://www.themailbox.com/magazines/a-pig-and-a-pancake/a-pig-and-a-pancake

 

Assessment worksheet: 

https://www.superteacherworksheets.com/phonics-beginningsounds/letter-p_WFMWZ.pdf

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If You Give a Pig a Pancake by Laure Numeroff read along: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNiAktHBZa4